Defendant indicted in kidnapping initially deemed a hoax

– The man allegedly at the center of a weird kidnap-for-ransom plot in Vallejo was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury in Sacramento.

Muller allegedly broke into a Mare Island home on March 23 and restrained and drugged Aaron Quinn and kidnapped his girlfriend Denise Huskins, asking for a $8,500 ransom.

Muller, 38, of South Lake Tahoe, has been charged with one count of kidnapping. After Huskins reappeared two days later, Vallejo police said at a news conference the kidnapping was a hoax. “But the Vallejo Police Department, the FBI, and our law enforcement allies in Alameda County have done excellent work in recent months to bring this investigation to a conclusion”.

He will return to federal court in Sacramento on Monday to be arraigned on the federal indictment, which replaces an earlier criminal complaint filed by prosecutors.

The charge carries a possible maximum sentence of life in prison if Muller is convicted.